NBL Wrap Round 13: End the year and pass that sphere

Where did things go wrong for the Kings? At home in front of their home crowd, Khazzouh back from the States and settled back into the team facing a team coming off a loss. But the 36ers had other things on their mind, to come in, ambush and get the hell out of there. The 36ers inflicterd their damage from long range shooting 9/27 from deep. The King’s long range arsenal was flaccid by comparison. Sydney going 0/10 from outside. Things weren’t all peachy for the 36ers however, their free throw shooting was sketchy (13/22 @ 59%).

To even the playing field the league is making Johnson shoot with one hand

Daniel Johnson is simply having his way with the league lately and though his form isn’t extending to beyond the arc, Johnson is putting up some good numbers including a 21 point and 14 rebound haul against Khazzouh. Steve Weigh scored 17, Nathan Herbert 14 and Chris Warren finished with 13 points

The longer this game went the more the Kings looked disinterested. Was it a case of ‘let’s forget this game, we have the Hawks next’? We certainly hope not, we hate to see teams just simply quit on a game. Luke Cooper scored a team high 13 points whilst Julian Khazzouh and Anatoly Bose were the pick of these stockbrokers, both with 12 points and 9 rebounds.

One word to describe the Taipans performance. Usual. One word to describe the Breakers. Atrocious. The Breakers put on one of the worst performances of the season, their reward was to get utterly pwn’d by the Taipans.

The Breakers shot a terrible 34% from the field, 21% behind the arc and a dismal 44% from the charity stripe. If that wasn’t bad enough they also racked up 24 turnovers whilst dishing only 2 assists as a team for the whole game.

This wasn’t what the Breakers were hoping for in CJ Bruton’s return to action. New Zealand bought a whole new meaning to this site’s term ‘stock exchange’ Alex Pledger scored a team high with 10 poinjts, Mika Vukona and Gary Wilkinson both scored 9 points.

This was a healthy win for the Taipans to get their season back on track after two straight losses. Alex Loughton scored a game high 20 points, Jamar Wilson had 18 and Ian Crosswhite 12.

The Melbourne Tigers held out for a seven point win in a thriller against the Blaze on the Gold Coast.

Ayinde Ubaka hasn’t stepped up that much this season but like Ubaka has done before us many times he stepped his game up down the stretch. Ubaka scored 10 fourth quarter points to keep the Tigers in the game but it was Liam Rush who nailed a clutch three pointer to put his team up by three. The Blaze couldn’t contain Ubaka nor make their own shots, the Tigers able to get the win in the thriller.

Mark Worthington and Anthony Petrie made use of the Tiger’s undersized front court, Wortho with 17 points and Petrie with 15, it was the Blaze’s guards that couldn’t keep up, especially with Ubaka down the stretch.  

Cameron Tragardh continues to inspire the Tigers, Tragardh finished with a game high 25 points, Liam Rush had 20 points and Ubaka 15 points.

After abolishing the then league leaders last week the Wildcats continued their blistering form against the Crocs, another team touted as contenders. Perth chipped out to an early lead thanks largely to Luke Nevill who used his strength over Luke Schenscher. The fight in the Crocs died out at half time the Wildcats powering away to a 21 point victory.

The Crocs weren’t able to man up, the result was the Wildcats shooting 52% from the field, but that would only be half the concern for Paul Woolpert as his team forgot the basics of basketball and allowed the Wildcats to grab 44 rebounds (16 offensive) whilst pulling in only 25 themselves.

As mentioned earlier, Luke Nevill clearly won the ‘battle of the Lukes’, Nevill wil 21 points (at 77%) and grabbed 7 boards, Jesse Wagstaff continues his hot form adding another 18 points to the Wildcats tally whilst Kevin Lisch kept the scorer’s busy with 16.

Townsville will be hoping to wash this one quickly as they need to prepare for their busy schedule in the following rounds. Peter Crawford had 14 and Todd Blanchfield had 12.

Though the Hawks put up some fight they were not able to end their losing streak against their interstate rivals. The Hawks did manage to chip away at the deficit in the final term but eventually ran out of time, you can’t help but think if the game still had 12 minute quarters the Hawks probably would have stolen this one.

Up by 17 with three and a half minutes to go the Kings need to figure out how to close a game. In theory this game shouldn’t of been so close; but let’s not forget the fight this Wollongong team shows at times.

The Hawks have not won since they beat the then surging Breakers in  New Zealand in round 6. Since then they have dropped 5 straight, the run of losses only broken via a bye in round 12. Tim Coenrad provided the spark off the bench and led the way with 18 points, Glen Saville added 14 and Joevan Catron put on 13 (points, not kilos over Christmas).

The Kings were led by Anatoly Bose who grabbed 7 boards to go with his game high 23 points. Jerai Grant was dominant inside scoring 14 points and grabbing 14 boards. Last year’s rookie of the year Ben Magden added 13 to the Kings total which included a couple of vital trips to the line inside the final minute of the game.

Sydney did fail to nail a triple on Friday night, a feat usually worthy of this award but the Breakers where light-years (a measure of distance, not time) ahead in taking out this week’s award with their 2 assist ‘haul’ against the Taipans.

It has been suggested that the statisticians do not work in the away teams favour before but there is no excuse for such a dismal assist tally. The Breakers must have set the NBL record for lowest number of assists in a game right?

At the end of the day, basketball is a team sport and if you aren’t dropping dimes chances are you aren’t playing as a team.

Darren Ng sent the crowd into a frenzy with his half court buzzer beater against the Kings on Friday night. The Doctor also ordered an ‘and one’ with it to which the referee’s refused. Darren may be a little bit unlucky not to get the bonus free throw on this. (thanks to ANZballaz for the video).